Day: June 30, 2025

Many of the same people telling us that we need to keep a stiff upper lip and accept the hard truth that the Bible teaches eternal conscious hell have a tendency to, at the same time, soften and air condition eternal conscious hell themselves. ¹ The idea of “air conditioning” hell usually comes up in traditionalist polemics. For example, see “Albert Mohler, Air Conditioning Hell: How Liberalism Happens,” albertmohler.com [blog],
posted January 26, 2010, https://albertmohler.com/2010/01/26/air-conditioning-hell-how-liberalism-happens/ (accessed June 29, 2025). That is to say, if we compare what they say eternal conscious hell consists of to what has historically been believed and to what the Bible would teach if it taught eternal conscious hell, there would be no comparison. They say that not only is the fire metaphorical, but the idea that God or his agents are actively causing extreme physical pain and suffering as punishment for sin is metaphorical as well. Hell is much more about internal turmoil, regret about being separated from God (and therefore the source of all goodness), etc.

This isn’t anything new. I and others have written about this before (see notes below). But it is a trend that continues to this day.

For example, many who are interested in the topic of annihilationism/evangelical conditionalism will be aware that Gavin Ortlund recently did a video on the topic. Notably for our purposes, Ortlund expresses a preference for annihilationism over eternal conscious hell but says that we must submit to the truth of the latter. ² Gavin Ortlund, “Annihilationism: Why I’m Not Convinced,” YouTube video [starting 28:00], posted May 19, 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4IgjsKbxjI (accessed June 29, 2025). He also speaks of “caricatures” of hell that show it as a torture chamber of sorts and cites C.S. Lewis as an authority on what hell is really like. ³ Gavin Ortlund, “Annihilationism: Why I’m Not Convinced,” [starting 28:00]. Fans of Rethinking hell will also know that I myself got to be on our super-sized live response to his video, and one major point of contention I called out at the end was Ortlund’s softening of hell while insisting that the traditional view is true. ⁴ Rethinking Hell, “Rethinking Hell Live 114: Responding (Again) to Gavin Ortlund,” Youtube Video[starting 3:55:27], posted May 22, 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eq_feY6Ooxg (accessed June 29, 2025).

Of course, Gavin Ortlund is just one of many, especially within the apologetics community. In a previous article, which one might say is my flagship article on the matter at hand, I give several examples including J.P. Moreland, Frank Turek, and William Lane Craig. ⁵ See “The Many and Varied Problems with the Modern, Metaphorical View of Eternal Conscious Hell“. This take on hell is very much within the mainstream of evangelical Christianity.

I have noted before that major church figures throughout church history, if they believed in eternal conscious hell at all, believed it was a place of fire and torture and active wrath against the wicked. It was not locked from the inside. The fire was not a metaphor for a state of regret or anguish over being separated from God. The dominant historical view of eternal conscious hell was far more like the divine torture chamber that Dante envisioned than it was like the quiet sadness chamber of modern apologists. ⁶ For more on this, see “The Not-So-Traditional View: Does Your Particular Belief About Hell Really Have Church History On Its Side?” Parts 1, 2, and 3.

While I consider this so-called caricature view to ultimately be unbiblical, I find any metaphorical, softened view of eternal conscious hell to be absurd on its face. It is obvious in its falsity in ways that are not the case for the actually-traditional traditional view of hell as a place of eternal conscious burning. In a nutshell, the very passages used to argue for eternal conscious hell tend to do so by appealing to what at least appears to show ongoing fire, ongoing torment in fire, etc.  This is in addition to the fact that passages that speak of not just fire but incineration (like 2 Peter 2:6) make little sense if there is neither fire nor literal destruction. ⁷ For more on this and how it affects all metaphorical forms of eternal conscious hell, not just modern air-conditioned versions, see “Why the Modern Version of the Eternal Torment Doctrine Falls Short“. It is not as though there many passages that generically say hell is eternal and conscious, and then separately other passages speak of fire in hell. Rather, the fire, the torment, the worms, etc. are what are (supposedly) said to go on forever and those things themselves are the basis for eternal conscious hell in the first place. ⁸ Daniel 12:2 would be one of the few exceptions, since most who hold an air-conditioned view would be okay with saying shame and contempt last forever in hell. For example, Matthew 25:41 doesn’t say “eternal hell.” It is appealed to by traditionalists specifically because it says “eternal fire“. The eternal conscious experience of being burned in the fire is then (incorrectly) inferred. ⁹ As to why Matthew 25:41 does not teach eternal conscious hell, see “What the Bible Actually Says about ‘Eternal Fire'” Parts 1 and 2. But in the softened, metaphorical views like those Ortlund advocates in the video, none of those things are actually part of hell at all.

The one that really gets me is when those who hold to a fireless, tortureless, separation-from-God view of hell appeal to Revelation 14:9-11. And a big reason I appeal to Gavin Ortlund’s video here is because his case against annihilationism relies almost entirely on this passage and on Revelation 20:10 (which has similar problems). ¹⁰ For more on why Revelation 14:9-11 does not teach the doctrine of eternal conscious hell, see “A Primer on Revelation 14:9-11” and “A Primer of Revelation 20:10“. ¹¹See also Chris Date and William Tanksley’s, “RH LIVE! Episode 61: Hell and the Book of Revelation, with William Tanksley“.

Consider what we see in Revelation 14:9-11:

Then another angel, a third one, followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of His anger; and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; they have no rest day and night, those who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name.” ¹² Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org

It is understandable why one might think that this passage teaches eternal torment – at least if they ignore the Old Testament background and other points brought up in our noted responses. The people in view are tormented with fire, and the smoke that results from their torment in the fire rises for ever and ever. Therefore, the burning itself goes on for ever and ever. And if one holds to the actually-traditional view of eternal fiery torture – the view that Gavin Ortlund and many other modern apologists call a caricature but that was held by many of their own favorite teachers of past eras – then there is at least some consistency here. The case for eternal conscious hell, namely a place of eternal physical torment in fire, is based on a passage that (they believe) shows people being eternally tormented in literal, physical fire.

The problem is when this passage is appealed to by people who believe that hell is not literal fire, hell is not a place of extreme physical pain imposed from the outside out of wrath and vengeance, and hell is primarily separation from God.  This passage, a favorite among traditionalists, is about extreme physical pain imposed from the outside, in physically burning fire, out of unmitigated wrath and vengeance. And for good measure, this physical torment occurs in the presence of the Jesus (v. 10)!

There is an astounding lack of self-awareness on the part of many who appeal to this passage.

Now, in a somewhat recent internet discussion, someone did attempt to call me out as being dishonest by trying to convince people that softened views of eternal conscious hell are invalid on the grounds that I am really just doing it so people will find the eternal conscious hell view harder to accept and be more sympathetic to annihilationism. But I have never pretended otherwise. I basically wrote a whole article saying as much. ¹³ See “The Traditional View of Hell Is Rightly Called ‘Eternal Torture’ (At Least Traditionally“.

If the air conditioned eternal conscious hell view was at least valid and reasonable then I would take a very different approach. But there is no justification for holding to a view like that of C.S. Lewis or apologists who have followed. ¹⁴ C.S. Lewis was not remotely the first to teach metaphorical fire in hell, and he probably wasn’t the first major teacher to insist on believing in eternal conscious hell while removing much of what made it objectionable to people. But he was a major influence in this regard. It is a cop out. It’s biblically vacuous and lacks the one strength that the eternal conscious hell view typically has, which is dominance in church history. So yes, if you think the Bible teaches eternal conscious hell, then you have to own the real thing.

You can’t go appealing to passages about God actively burning people with physical fire and sulfur as proof that hell is eternal suffering while also saying God would never actually burn someone forever and hell is just about their self-imposed sadness. You can’t go arguing that we should believe in eternal conscious hell because Christian tradition has predominantly (though not unanimously) taught eternal conscious hell yet also say that eternal conscious hell is really quite radically different from what almost everyone taught until recently. ¹⁵ For more on the early church and the presence of both universalism and annihilationism, see “Introduction to Evangelical Conditionalism: The Doctrine of Eternal Torment Was Not Universal in the Early Church“. We must be consistent.

There is so much psycho-analyzing of annihilationists by traditionalists, on how we don’t want to accept the hard view of eternal conscious hell and so forth. We just soften the Bible’s teaching to be more tolerable to the masses! And yet it is hard to say that there is not a lot of that going on across the board in Christianity now. Eastern Orthodox apologists increasingly try to argue that their tradition always taught the view that hell and heaven are both just God’s presence experienced differently throughout eternity – as if their own ancient saints aren’t among those who taught the fiery torture view. ¹⁶ For more on this, see “The Not-So-Traditional View: Does Your Particular Belief About Hell Really Have Church History On Its Side? (Part 3)“. ¹⁷ For other reasons to deny this relatively recent Eastern Orthodox view of hell, see “The Modern Eastern Orthodox View and the Hellfire of God’s Love“. Air-conditioned views are at least acceptable within Roman Catholicism. ¹⁸ John Paul II. General Audience,” [Sermon] General Audience, July 28, 1999. The Holy See, n.d., http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/audiences/1999/documents/hf_jp-ii_aud_28071999.html/ (accessed June 30, 2025). “The images of hell that Sacred Scripture presents to us must be correctly interpreted. They show the complete frustration and emptiness of life without God. Rather than a place, hell indicates the state of those who freely and definitively separate themselves from God, the source of all life and joy.” And it is not as though there are not plenty of examples in otherwise theologically conservative evangelicalism.

But what basis is there for this view, other than to cling to the traditional view while making it more tolerable? The comments in Ortlund’s video were rich with discussion on this and other matters related to this view, and in them you are unlikely to find anything of substance when this very question was posed. Because there is no substance. The whole metaphorical view relies on flimsy arguments like the claim that that fire and darkness cannot co-exist (they can) and therefore every description of hell must be metaphorical. ¹⁹ For more on how fire and darkness can co-exist, and how traditionalists in church history didn’t overlook the existence of both in scripture when teaching hell was literal fire, see Ronnie Demler, “Yes, Fire and Darkness Can Coexist,” Consuming Fire [blog], Patheos, posted July 11, 2016 (accessed June 30, 2025).  There is essentially no affirmative argument from any biblical texts, apart from perhaps an occasional connection that even the view’s adherents probably know are paper thin. ²⁰ 2 Thessalonians 1:9 may come up, based on translation, due to potential connection to separation from God. But the connection to air-conditioned hell is paper thin, as shown by the fact that Jesus comes in fire and flames and deals retribution tot he wicked int he proceeding verses. This view of eternal conscious hell seems to assume a bizarre premise that the Bible and church history teach that hell is eternal and conscious but are vague on any other details, and so we need to speculate on what makes the most sense within that very broad framework. This is not the case at all, for reasons outlined here and elsewhere.

You don’t get to have your cake and eat it too. You don’t get to be part of the club by believing the hard, traditional view and being a good boy or girl while also changing the traditional view into something more tolerable for the masses. Accept what your view about hell entails if you really are convinced that it is biblical. And if it gives you trouble to accept it, then at least in this case, that’s because the doctrine of eternal conscious hell isn’t biblical in the first place.